


tell me how you're sleeping easy

by GuardianKarenTerrier



Series: Week Four: Future [2]
Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: (adrien is not picking up on those hints), Advice, Autistic Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hinted OT4, Platonic Cuddling, Podfic Welcome, Post Team Identity Reveals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-27
Updated: 2019-08-27
Packaged: 2020-09-27 21:53:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20414896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GuardianKarenTerrier/pseuds/GuardianKarenTerrier
Summary: Adrien takes a deep breath and considers letting his transformation go, but then decides a little guiltily that he'd rather put off Plagg's commentary a little longer.  "I, uh. Do you and Alya ever talk about- about the- the future, I guess?""Like, after defeating Hawkmoth?" Nino asks, a little blankly.  "I guess we joke around about getting a place with you two eventually." He makes a face.  "And Chloe, I guess, but I dunno if that's really a good idea- um. Too much?"Adrien tries very hard to make his face stop doing whatever it's doing, because it definitely did not have his permission.





	tell me how you're sleeping easy

**Author's Note:**

> for the 'dadrien' prompt for adrienaugreste
> 
> thanks shinobicyrus!

"Dude?" Nino says, uncertainly, from the ground. He looks around for a moment, only relaxing a little bit at seeing no one else is around. "Dude, please remember that I don't have Wayzz with me right now. And I _ also _ did not have, like, practice with a climbing wall or with the sneaking out, you have _ no idea _ what I owe Alya for covering for me right now-"

Chat Noir drops back down closer to Nino and offers him a hand up.

"Thanks," Nino says, grudgingly, as Chat Noir hauls him onto the roof after him. Adrien doesn't think to warn him in time and he winces as the palms of Nino's hands skid on the gravel. "You know, this is _ not _ the kind of place I thought I'd find- well, either of you, actually. This is one of your and Ladybug's spots, isn't it?"

Adrien shrugs and turns back towards the greenhouse that's half-hidden in the shadows on the back half of the roof. His boots don't make any sound on the gravel. 

He hears Nino scrambling after him, though.

"Dude, again, _ not transformed_," Nino pants, sliding into the greenhouse behind him. "Also, you are being super quiet and it is freaking me out a bit." He pauses. "No, that's a lie, it's freaking me out a _lot_, dude."

Adrien doesn't drop his own transformation, but he does wave Nino over to a couple of folding chairs in a corner.

Picking his way gingerly around several planters that are strewn strategically close together, Nino looks at the chairs and opts for Adrien's usual spot. Adrien doesn't _ think _ there's anything that makes it obvious which chair's his and which one is Ladybug's but Nino seems to see something. 

"Still being real quiet," Nino says, softly. "Kinda getting worried about it. What's up?"

Adrien looks behind them, even though he knows he's shut the door and that even if he hadn't no one else ever comes up here. Even if someone _ does _ those scattered plants prevent getting a clear view into this corner- that's the whole reason they'd scattered them. 

He takes a deep breath and considers letting his transformation go, but then decides a little guiltily that he'd rather put off Plagg's commentary a little longer. "I, uh. Do you and Alya ever talk about- about the- the future, I guess?"

"Like, after defeating Hawkmoth?" Nino asks, a little blankly. "I guess we joke around about getting a place with you two eventually." He makes a face. "And Chloe, I guess, but I dunno if that's really a good idea- um. Too much?"

Adrien tries very hard to make his face stop doing whatever it's doing, because it definitely did not have his permission. 

He'd been surprised that _ Marinette _ had thought seriously about what they were doing after school. He doesn't know _ what _to do with the idea that not only have Nino and Alya talked about it too, but that their plans have included the rest of the team. 

He almost wishes he'd asked Chloe to talk, because he's sure that _ she _ hasn't thought this far ahead. She won't be surprised that he hadn't, either. 

"Chat Noir?" Nino asks, carefully. "You okay, dude? Sorry, I guess I just assumed- I know how much the team means to you, and we kinda, I mean, we kinda figure it'll be easier if we all just stick together. Easier to get away for an attack." He scratches the back of his neck, awkwardly. "Also, you know, easier to afford a place when we do _ not _ know how any of us are gonna hold jobs, like-"

"Marinette asked if I wanted kids," Adrien blurts, dropping onto his own chair and clinging tightly to his tail with both hands. "And I do? I think I do? But I hadn't ever thought of it before, I mean not really, and I sort of blanked on an answer and-"

"Dude, _ breathe_," Nino says firmly, getting up for just long enough that Adrien's sincerely worried he's about to leave. Nino sits down next to him instead, though, and gives the chair an uncertain look before shaking his head and turning back to Adrien. "Marinette of all people is not gonna judge you for getting tongue-tied."

Adrien does take Nino's advice and take several deep breaths, slumping into Nino's side. The chair rocks slightly and Adrien startles, realising for the first time that even though he and Ladybug frequently share one of the folding chairs Marinette is also considerably smaller than Nino.

Nino plants one foot more firmly on the ground and the chair steadies.

"It's not that." Adrien tries to breathe normally again. "I mean that didn't help, but it wasn't that. It's just- Nino, I don't know how to be a parent!"

"Um." Nino blinks and gives him a worried glance. "Okay, so, just before I start here this _ is_, like, hypothetical, right?"

Adrien blinks at him, confused, and isn't any less mystified when Nino breathes what looks like a sigh of relief.

"Good," Nino mutters, apparently to himself. "Because oh man, I am _ not _ prepared to deal with that... Adrien, dude, what makes you think that _ anyone _ knows that?"

Adrien hunches in on himself, because even though he'd called Nino himself and wanted to talk to him he doesn't really know _ how _ to talk about this. He's very quiet when he says, "I guess that's kind of the problem. That I don't. Um."

"Oh." Nino sobers immediately, and he'd been fairly serious to begin with. "Look, you know who'd actually have some good advice for you about this?"

"Um." Adrien eyes him, then looks around the greenhouse. "Nino, I know I can be kind of oblivious but-"

"Yes, okay, you don't know, got it," Nino says hastily. "And I'm guessing Plagg wasn't being real helpful?" 

Adrien winces, but that he takes more advice from Plagg than is probably wise is common knowledge among the rest of the team now. "Not really, no. He mostly keeps trying to get me to leave and live with Marinette _ now _ and I have to keep explaining that I can't."

Nino starts to say something and then very obviously cuts himself off, clearing his throat and starting over. "Right, so. You know me and Marinette have been friends since, like, forever, right?"

"Is this going to be something she won't want you telling me?" Adrien asks, unhappily. "Because if it is I don't want to know it."

"No, dude, she won't care if you know." Nino shifts a little closer into Adrien's side, although he doesn't wrap an arm around him the way Ladybug already would have. "She only won't have told you because I doubt she's ever thought of it. Remember her grandma showing up for her birthday party?"

Considering he's still not sure how they'd juggled their identities with that particular attack, he really can't forget. "Befana. Yeah."

"Her granddad didn't come 'cause he hadn't spoken to her dad in years," Nino says, quietly. "I don't know if he even knew about Marinette. It used to really bug her, when we were kids, 'cause I think M. Dupain never really stopped hoping that he'd get back in touch. I think that day you guys fought him? Was, like, the first time Marinette ever actually _talked_ to him."

Adrien blinks. "She was at his house, Nino. Baking bread. They were having a competition!"

"Okay, as much as I wanna say 'not the weirdest thing I've heard today,' Alya says I can't use that any more." Nino rubs his forehead. "I don't know what happened that day, obviously, but trust me we went a _ real _ long time without her meeting him. The _ point _ I was gonna make, dude, is if you're really super worried then talk to Marinette's dad!"

Adrien freezes up more than a little at that. 

"Oh-" Nino winces. "Sorry, dude. I guess that _ is _ potentially awkward."

"A _ little bit_," Adrien wheezes, unfreezing. "Not, uh, not sure how he'd take that."

"The man has been inviting me over weekly since we were like six, I think he'd be fine with it." Nino shifts again, but stops when Adrien clings to him without meaning to. He sighs and Adrien starts to pull away, but Nino presses against his shoulder before he can. "Seriously, dude, he'd get it. Probably better than I will. But also- I think the fact that you're here _ asking _ me about it means you probably don't gotta worry?"

Adrien is still tense, but he does stop to think about that. He doubts his parents had ever really discussed their parenting with anyone else. The only people he remembers them ever being close enough to have _ had _ that discussion with were Chloe's parents and Nathalie, and Chloe's parents pretty obviously hadn't done anything like his had. 

And if Nathalie had disapproved, she certainly hadn't made it clear anywhere Adrien could see. 

"See?" Nino says firmly. "You don't gotta worry, dude. And honestly, you know you can always just, like, _ tell _ Marinette if you are, she'll understand."

"I know," Adrien says, quietly. "You know I usually do. This was just- she sounded really excited about it, Nino, I didn't want her to know that I'm-" He swallows. "I don't even know _ how _to explain it."

Nino snorts. "Oh, like you two ever need to explain anything to each other."

"We do," Adrien insists, obscurely hurt by the implication and not sure why. "We do, all the time, it's a whole-" He gestures, vaguely. "We're partners, we talk to each other." 

"That isn't what I meant, dude," Nino says, but gently. He nods at down at where Adrien's still absently twisting his tail in his hands. "Maybe it's 'cause of how you met, but you're actually like, really good at communicating with each other. Which is _ weird _, by the way, 'cause I have seen you both try to communicate as civilians."

"_Hey,_" Adrien says. 

"You take advice from Plagg. Like, regularly. I can tell."

Adrien winces. "He does give _ some _good advice."

Nino waits patiently. "And?"

"And... okay, when you were akumatised he kept trying to get me to go enjoy the party," Adrien admits.

Nino snickers. "In defense of akumatised-me, I'm not actually gonna object to that. It _ was _sorta the point."

Adrien laughs a little awkwardly, because he's never forgotten that Nino was akumatised _ for him_. Even now, countless akuma later, that's rare. Most people's negative emotions on other people's behalf aren't enough for Hawkmoth to target. 

"Adrien," Nino says, turning to give him a one-armed hug. "I'm serious. I think you're worrying too much about just talking to Marinette about it, I think she'd understand, but also if you ever get to a point where you're comfortable talking to her dad about it? Dude would _ definitely _ be glad to talk to you about it. He might be really happy to talk to you about it, honestly, I think he's still sorta working out how to feel about his own dad only talking to him again _ now _." 

Adrien wonders if Nino is making talking to M. Dupain sound like a better idea by the moment intentionally, or if it's just a coincidence. Adrien knows that he's far from the only person who has a complicated relationship with his father, but it hadn't occurred to him as something that he could _ talk _ to people about before. Even if it had he wouldn't have thought of going to Marinette's parents.

He probably should have. Even though they still see more of Chat Noir than they do of Adrien, they've never been anything but warm and welcoming to both versions of him. 

Adrien sighs and finally lets go of his tail. "Thanks, Nino. I might have to do that."

"So I helped?" Nino says, with enough of an obvious teasing tone in his voice for even Adrien to catch. 

"You helped," Adrien assures him, levering himself up off the chair. "But we should probably get home."

Nino snorts as he accepts Adrien's hand up. "You're kidding. I know you aren't going home, dude." 

Adrien reddens and rubs the back of his neck, looking away from Nino. "I-I don't know what you mean."

Nino rolls his eyes. "I _ am _dating Alya, dude, I know why she doesn't ever go spend the night at Marinette's anymore." He gives Adrien a knowing look. "Although we probably could, right?"

Adrien wills himself to _ stop _ flushing and doesn't succeed. "I still don't know what you mean."

"The idea for a shared apartment wasn't a random one, you know." It's Nino that looks away this time. "I, uh, really wasn't kidding about knowing how much the team means to you. To all of us. I dunno if we can manage it, but if we can, then-"

"I think we can find a way to pull that off," Adrien says quietly, thinking of the times the Gorilla's helped him get money from his own private funds without his father or Nathalie noticing. The Gorilla's the reason Adrien's been able to get Plagg's cheese without inviting awkward questions since Hawkmoth first started terrorising the city; Adrien thinks he'd probably help with this, too.

Adrien also thinks the man's contract has to be close to up by now and he isn't quite sure what to do with that information.

He doesn't want to think about that right now, though. 

"Thanks, Nino," he says instead, smiling at his friend. "See you in the morning?"

Nino narrows his eyes at him. "You are helping me back down off this roof _ first_, catboy."

**Author's Note:**

> title is from set it off's 'wolf in sheep's clothing!'


End file.
